Further information

SELF MADE CITY: New Urban Development Strategies and Housing Typologies

With more and more people moving to urban centres worldwide, new solutions for growth are needed: strategies for densification that actually improve and bring benefits to the surrounding neighborhood and enhance the walkability and livability of our cities. All too often, our city development is determined by profit-driven investments that lack quality.

Using international examples, mainly from Berlin, Kristien Ring introduced the idea of the "Self Made City".

Our cities are starting to be more defined by the people living there who are developing projects through self-initiative such as baugruppen, co-housing and co-working groups, co-op associations, and other project forms.

This talk and the associated exhibition demonstrated: new models for project development; how cost can be greatly reduced but building quality increased; diverse architectural and ecological building solutions; how projects consider social issues that enhance urban vitality; hybrid and mixed-use typologies that fuel urban interaction; and strategies that allow participants to collaborate in order to create their own personal solutions.

The success of our cities in the future will depend upon how we use the built developments of today to improve the quality of life in the city and to strengthen its unique diversity.

Kristien Ring is an architect, curator and author, originally from Pittsburgh, but living in Berlin since 1991. Her interdisciplinary studio, AA PROJECTS, engages with future oriented themes in architecture and urban planning. Her research explores how densification contributes to improving our cities. Kristien is the author of Self Made City. Berlin, Self-initiated Urban Living and Architectural Interventions, 2013 and Urban Living, Strategies for the future, 2015, (Jovis Publishers).

Self Made City explores the self-determined design of spaces and buildings for living and working and their impact on the quality of urban development. Urban Living looks at components of urban development and affordable housing as strategies for the future.Her research explores how densification contributes to improving our cities.

Kristien was the founding Director of the DAZ German Center for Architecture in Berlin (2004 -2011), the co-founder of the gallery Suitcase Architecture (2001 - 2005) in Berlin and continues to curate exhibitions on current architectural topics.

Kristien Ring’s exhibition Self Made City will be on display at the Cullity Gallery, located in the UWA Faculty of Architecture, Landscape and Visual Arts, Redlands Campus, from 18 August to 9 September.